Donnerstag, 19. Januar 2012

Q&A: Armenian genocide dispute

The mass killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks during World War I remains a highly sensitive issue.

Turkey
has resisted widespread calls for it to recognise the 1915-16 killings
as genocide, while historians continue to argue about the events.

What happened?
There
is general agreement that hundreds of thousands of Armenians died when
the Ottoman Turks deported them en masse from eastern Anatolia to the
Syrian desert and elsewhere in 1915-16. They were killed or died from
starvation or disease.
The total number of Armenian dead is
disputed. Armenians say 1.5 million died. The Republic of Turkey
estimates the total to be 300,000.
According to the International Association of Genocide Scholars, the death toll was "more than a million".

What is genocide?
Article
Two of the UN Convention on Genocide of December 1948 describes
genocide as carrying out acts intended "to destroy, in whole or in part,
a national, ethnic, racial or religious group".

Were the killings systematic?
The
dispute about whether it was genocide centres on the question of
premeditation - the degree to which the killings were orchestrated.
Many historians, governments and the Armenian people believe that they were; but a number of scholars question this.
Turkish
officials accept that atrocities were committed but argue that there
was no systematic attempt to destroy the Christian Armenian people.
Turkey says many innocent Muslim Turks also died in the turmoil of war.

What was the political context?
The
Young Turks - an officers' movement that had seized power in 1908 -
launched a series of measures against Armenians as the Ottoman Empire
was crumbling through military defeats in the war. The Young Turks -
calling themselves the Committee of Unity and Progress (CUP) - had
entered the war on Germany's side in 1914.
Turkish propaganda at the time presented the Armenians as saboteurs and a pro-Russian "fifth column".
Armenians
mark the date 24 April 1915 as the start of what they regard as the
genocide. That was when the Ottoman government arrested about 50
Armenian intellectuals and community leaders. They were later executed.
Armenians in the Ottoman army were disarmed and killed. Armenian property was confiscated.

Was anyone held to account?
Several
senior Ottoman officials were put on trial in Turkey in 1919-20 in
connection with the atrocities. A local governor, Mehmed Kemal, was
found guilty and hanged for the mass killing of Armenians in the central
Anatolian district of Yozgat. The Young Turks' top triumvirate - the
"Three Pashas" - had already fled abroad. They were sentenced to death
in absentia.
Historians have questioned the judicial procedures
at these trials, the quality of the evidence presented and the degree to
which the Turkish authorities may have wished to appease the victorious
Allies.

Who recognises it as genocide and who does not?
Argentina,
Belgium, Canada, France, Italy, Russia and Uruguay are among more than
20 countries which have formally recognised genocide against the
Armenians.
The European Parliament and the UN Sub-Commission on
Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities have also done
so.
The UK, US and Israel are among those that use different terminology to describe the events.
In
2006, Turkey condemned a French parliamentary vote which would make it a
crime to deny that Armenians had suffered genocide. The bill did not
become law - but Turkey suspended military ties.
In March 2010,
Turkey withdrew its ambassador to Washington after a US congressional
committee narrowly approved a resolution branding the killings as
"genocide". The House Foreign Affairs Committee endorsed it, despite the
objections of the White House. Barack Obama's administration has called
for the resolution not to be "acted upon" by the full Congress.

What is the political impact of the row?
The killings are regarded as the seminal event of modern Armenian history, binding the diaspora together.
Armenians are one of the world's most dispersed peoples.
In Turkey, public debate on the issue has been stifled.
Article
301 of the penal code, on "insulting Turkishness", has been used to
prosecute prominent writers who highlight the mass killings of
Armenians. Among them were Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk and Hrant Dink,
who was later shot dead in January 2007. A teenage nationalist is on
trial for his murder.
The European Union has said Turkish acceptance of the Armenian genocide is not a condition for Turkey's entry into the bloc.

Are Armenia-Turkey relations still frosty?
After
decades of hostility there has been a slight thaw. Turkey and Armenia
signed a deal in October 2009 to establish diplomatic relations and open
their border.
But the deal is yet to be ratified by either
parliament, and some in Ankara accuse Armenia of trying to alter the
terms of the deal.
A complicating factor is mutual suspicion over
the frozen Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Turkey backs Azerbaijan in the
dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh, a territory inside Azerbaijan held by
ethnic Armenians since a war in the 1990s.